This is the second of two Posts consisting of matters I’ve found or thought about, none of which are long enough to comprise an entire Post.
I. Idolatry
The First Commandment
“I am the Lord your God who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. You shall have no other gods before Me. “ Deuteronomy 5 6-7
“You shall not make for yourself a graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth; you shall not bow down to them or serve them…” Exodus n20:3-5
Psalm 146:3-5
“Put not your trust in princes,
Nor in any son of man, in whom there is no help.
When his spirit departs, he returns to his earth;
In that very day his plans perish.”
The First Commandment says there are “other gods” which we are forbidden to bow down and serve. Yes there are, and not only pagan statues. There are a multitude of other “gods” – people, things we can put before God. People can put absolute trust in “princes and sons of men”, emperors, autocrats, and also in philosophies, scientific theories, even religious concepts. (Never put complete trust in what a Blogger writes.)
It’s safe to place conditional trust in many lesser beings and things. Life couldn’t go on otherwise.
Idolatry consists of putting our absolute, total trust in anyone or anything other than God. That’s not only idolatry; it’s also stupidity. Anyone and anything less than God will perish. The idols always fail, and their “true believers” are riding for a fall with them.
In fairly recent times (by my aged standards) notable political idols have included Nazism and Communism. (I mean real Communism, not the foolish allegation of “communist” cast today by some politicians against opponents who are no such thing.) I’m tempted to add “unbridled capitalism” to the list, but I don’t want to go there now.
No matter its failings, no matter how much evil it caused, Soviet Communism was “the inevitable wave of the future” – except that it wasn’t. It lasted for seventy dreadful years, and in order to build the Marxist peoples’ paradise, millions of actual people had to be killed.
Millions put complete faith in Adolf Hitler (the video above gives me the cold chills) who was building a racist Nazi “Thousand Year Reich” – except that it wasn’t. Nazism lasted only twelve years, and in that short period did more evil, caused more deaths, than any political system ever seen before on earth. (Or was it Communism that killed more people?)
The fall of the idol results in disillusionment on the part of the former true believers, and the inability to trust again. Sometimes the next couple of generations can pull life back to normal again, as in Germany. Sometimes recovery takes much longer, as in Russia today.
Can you imagine that happening in our time? Surely modern people are too wise and sophisticated to become “true believers and put absolute trust in one man, so that no matter how many lies he tells, how absurd the things he says, how much he refuses to accept reality, how many women he abuses, how many people he denigrates, how much vengeance he threatens, they will unconditionally trust and follow him. Surely that couldn’t happen today.
When such a man falls, his idolaters will inevitably feel great despair and disillusionment. The harm a man like this causes certainly lasts longer than he does.
And it can even be worse: If the man who is being idolized actually begins to believe he can do no wrong, then some very bad things can result. He can take multitudes down with him when he falls.
II. Question: Is the Orthodox Church Conservative or Liberal?
Answer: No. Yes. Both. Neither… … Wrong Question.
I think it’s important to run through this again in an election year.
I remember, many years ago when I was still Episcopalian, I asked Father Thomas Hopko a question about a different matter. He paused only for a few seconds, then replied, “That question cannot be answered from the Orthodox point of view.”
Just so, questions about the Orthodox Church’s political position cannot be answered. The Orthodox Church is not political, but rather Traditional, grounded in the Holy Scriptures and the Church Fathers. In terms of contemporary American politics, we are conservative about some things (for example, abortion and sexual ethics); we are liberal about other things (for example, opposed to racism, in favor of human rights and the need to care for the poor and needy).
Orthodox social and ethical principles do not change. However, what is considered liberal or conservative varies from country to country and from time to time. British and Canadian conservatives support national health care. When I was young, conservative Republican President Richard Nixon favored national health care similar to the America’s present Affordable Care Act, which almost all Republicans now want to kill, while the liberal Democrats support it. Another obvious example: Only twelve years ago conservative Mitt Romney was the Republican candidate for president. Today he is considered a liberal pariah in the Republican party
Get the picture? Tigers may not change their stripes, but political parties do. Orthodoxy does not.
Contemporary politics is often described in avian terms: left wing, right wing. Well, then, the Holy Orthodox Church flies high above the lowly political bird. We come from Somewhere Else entirely.
Dear Orthodox brothers and sisters: No political candidate or party anywhere on earth at any time has ever agreed entirely with Orthodox teaching. If you think yours does, you’re missing something. Mine certainly does not. Our job: Choose the lesser of evils or the “better of goods”, say our prayers and vote. God be with you.
III. Want to get a different slant on the world?
I have two suggestions.
Khouria Dianna had been on Crete for a couple of weeks – I for nearly a month. This was in the old days when that meant we were virtually cut off from the news. (I tried to tune in BBC * radio at night, with only very limited scratchy success.) Now we were back at a hotel in Athens and eager to hear if the world was still there.
- British Broadcasting Corporation
The first cable news channel we turned to was American. It was nice to hear from home, but the newscasters seemed awfully excited. Maybe it was because they had to hurry to make time for all the commercials. So we turned to:
1 BBC World News. No commercials! and news from all over the world. We can get this here in Milwaukee, and I’m pretty sure you can too. Granted, they can sometimes get overly excited about the British Royals – but if you need a break from American cable news, which at the moment consists almost entirely of politics and commercials, try BBC World News on cable TVe, or https://www.bbc.com/news/world on your computer. There’s a whole wide interesting world out there that American newscasts often ignore. I also like the fact that BBC can give it straight. It does not have to satisfy commercial interests by drawing in “customers” from any side of the political spectrum.
2 Al Jazeera English (sponsored by the government of Qatar) which we then discovered for the first time. They covered the world in a calm, balanced way, with an emphasis on the East *, now especially Palestine. If you want to see what’s actually happening to Gaza, first-hand live, here it is – if you can handle it.
- Where did I discover that thousands had stood in the cold in Moscow to venerate the sash of the Holy Mother of God? On Al Jazeera!
We were eager to tune in Al Jazeera when we got home. Surprise! Al Jazeera is not among the twenty gazillion channels available in Milwaukee. No room for Al Jazeera, eh? We wonder why. If you can get it in your area, watch it and see what you think. In any event, we can all get their news online: https://www.aljazeera.com/.
IV. Abortion: Perplexities
I wrote most recently about abortion two years ago, just as the Roe v Wade decision had been overturned. If you wish, you can access those two Posts at the bottom of this article.
I’m perplexed about many things:
1. Why are “Bible alone” Evangelicals militantly opposed to abortion? The Bible says nothing about abortion. Where are they getting it from?
2. Traditional Roman Catholics strongly oppose abortion. However, the Roman Catholic Church officially * opposes most forms of birth control – properly “conception control” – the simplest way to limit abortions. The argument is that “birth control” by any means other than “natural planning” interferes with nature. So what? We interfere with nature all the time: We build dams to interfere with floods. We build houses to interfere with the dangers of heat and cold. I am about to have a hip replacement to interfere with a natural development of old age. Really: do you want me to be “naturally” crippled for the rest of my life? Why should “conception control” alone be immoral? I don’t get it.
- How many RCs pay attention to this? I can guess, but I don’t know.
3. I don’t understand why people think picketing abortion clinics will help much. (It’s too late.)
4. Here’s what I’m not perplexed about: How to limit abortions. ;
- We need to teach our youth that it’s best to delay sexual intercourse till after marriage. Most young people in previous generations managed to handle that – and you can’t?
- But we also need to be realistic: Today sex outside marriage is fashionable. It’s all over the entertainment media. Too many young people are not going to wait. So we also need to teach our youth about “birth control” and make means of birth control readily available.
- Above all we need to teach our Orthodox people clearly that abortion as an ordinary means of birth control is sinful, wrong, unacceptable – except in extroardinary circumstances. So, you couples, both married and unmarried, do not get yourselves unintentionally pregnant!
- Also we need to do whatever is necessary to get maternity health care for poor mothers and required maternity leave in this country. Here are the countries in the world that do not require maternity leave: the Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Tonga and the United States of America.
Back to perplexities:
5. Why is abortion sometimes now called “women’s health care”? If pregnancy threatens her health or her life, then it’s health care. Otherwise, abortion is killing a baby in the womb. Also, why do the media now sometimes refer to “pregnant persons”. Can men give birth? (If so, I don’t want to hear about it…)
6. I wrote in 2022 that reversing Roe v Wade wouldn’t be effective, that statistics would certainly show that there were fewer abortions, but in fact we would have no idea how many abortions were taking place, because many would not be reported, would be “sub rosa”, so to speak.
I was wrong in a perplexing way. According to the only stats I have found *, the number of reported abortions actually increased in the year after Roe v Wade was overturned! Add to that the number of unreported abortions, and the evidence thus far (even though obtaining an abortion is nearly impossible in at least fifteen states) is that reversing Roe v Wade has not had the intended effect. Why? No one seems to know..
- Two sources among many: 1) Forbes: https://www.forbes.com/sites/alisondurkee/2024/02/28/abortion-rates-have-been-consistently-elevated-since-supreme-court-overturned-roe-v-wade-study-finds/ 2) Wall Street Journal: https://www.wsj.com/us-news/roe-v-wade-is-gone-but-abortions-are-on-the-rise-383ffaf4
7. Why are our heirarchs and legislators and canon lawyers missing the obvious: Pregnancy is not a “do it yourself” project. If there has been an abortion, why is the penalty imposed only on the woman? The father 
should also be subject to that same penalty. Guys, if she goes to prison, so do you. If she is executed, so are you. If she is excluded from the Sacraments for a time, so are you. Men, if you got her pregnant do not try to weasel out of your responsibility. These days they can track you down by your dna, and they should.
8. The longer I live, the more suspicious I become of the secular government’s ability to legislate adequately about abortion. Abortion is a deeply personal and often complex matter. It can be dealt with pastorally and effectuvely in the Church by a woman and her pastor, or between a woman and her doctor. But can you imagine a pregnant woman going to her congressman or alderman for counseling?
9. Forgive me if I fall into heresy or something here: Something within me says that there is a vast difference between a fertilized egg or even an early abortion, and killing a sentient kid in school with an AR-15. Almost a difference in kind. I strongly disagree with myself here.
V. Sexual Identity
How many sexes are there? There are two: male and female. How do we know this? It’s established when we hear the first cry by doctors or nurses: “It’s a boy!” “It’s a girl!” That is the only rational way to determine sexual identity. With extremely rare exception *, people are born either male or female.
- about 0.018% (National Institute of Health)
The current secular consensus seems to be that sexual identity is determined by whatever people feel they are at the moment. Uh uh. Anything other than “it’s a boy” or “it’s a girl” is off the God-given norm.
Now, the role and dress of the sexes change with time. Once men wore skirts; the clergy still do! A century ago it was scandalous for women to wear slacks. Now look! Then a woman running for president was thought unnatural. (Queen Elizabeth I who ruled four centuries ago would have disagreed!) These are natural societal changes.
However, various feelings and tendencies that they were born the wrong sex may develop in some people, especially the young as they begin to mature. Some of this may truly be coming from within them – a physical or mental cause. Some of it (forgive me for suggesting this) may be caused simply by what’s fashionable at the time. (This kind of confusion was extremely rare when I was young. Unusual sexual identities were not in fashion at that time.)
If young people become unsure of their sexuality, they should not be condemned. We should never be cruel to people who are struggling in this way. They should be treated gently, and receive care to help them discover who they are. In this world, there is much that is off the norm, isn’t there? some of it far more harmful than people being confused about their sexual identity. If the confusion continues, I believe decisions about this should never be made till they “come of age”, are 18 at the least.
Incidentally, I have read that a few people now wish to be addressed as “they”! They believe they have multiple identities within them. Remember what Christ did when He met the Gadarene demoniac who said he had multiple demons within him? He exorcised him and cast them out.
VI. What does it mean to be masculine?
Today the world (I’m thinking especially now of the political world) offers us three very distinct images of masculinity:
1 The “macho man”: dominant, self-centered, pushy.
2 The man who is strong but gentle, for the sake of serving others.
3 The man who tries to establish his masculinity by defiling women and degrading others (especially women), who is undisciplined, unbounded by norms, forever whining and complaining.
I leave it up to you: Which of these is more like the only true Man, our Lord Jesus?
VII. What does it mean to be feminine?
I don’t know. I’m not a woman. And I perceive that most women are pretty tired of men trying to define them and their roles.
Next Week: No Post. I’m having hip replacement surgery next Wednesday. I had the same surgery ten years ago on my other hip, by the same doctor, and there is 98% success rate, so I’m not at all worried. Nevertheless, please say a prayer for me, if you will.
Week after Next: That all depends.